Episode 5 - Any Way the Wind Blows
His feet clopped across the ground as he trotted down the hallway. He wiped his brow, heading further into the darkness. It was after hours, he was supposed to be back home by now. But he couldn't not when they were so close to being finished.
He had been working on the engine for years at this point, it was his creation, his baby. It was so close.
He opened the door, quietly, and sat down in his seat. He looked at the turbine from behind a glass window. It sat there, massive, oval shaped, over normal looking.
He put his safety goggles on and started it up, only the window keeping him safe. The turbine whipped and whirled the wind inside the room with an incredible force, the strongest he had ever seen it. It was beautiful.
He stopped the machine, and laughed to himself, leaning back in his chair.
"Only a bit longer..." He said to himself, "And you'll finally be complete."
He then felt something on his shoulder. A... paw? It didn't feel like any he had ever seen. Cold, clammy, like leather. He turned around, not knowing what to expect.
"Hey, Hoggles." It was a horrible monster, with an unnatural face, a horn coming from it's forehead, and a mouth that didn't move as it spoke.
The pig fell to the ground with a thud, scurrying away from the monster.
"Who..." He paused, not the right question. "What are you?" He finished.
"Relax, Doctor." It said, pulling out a strange looking knife. "I got no business with you, but your turbine over there..." He pointed to the engine with his knife.
The creature walked over and crouched over the horrified pig, "Now that's definitely something I'm interested in."
It stood up, and threw the knife towards the window. It was meant to be bullet proof, but somehow this knife had completely shattered it. The pig watched helplessly as the monster climbed through window and admired the machine.
"Wow," It said, arms crossed. "This thing's pretty big. Might need the cavalry."
It quickly turned around and began yelling, "COME ON IN, BOYS! IT'S TIME TO DO YOUR JOBS!"
Quickly, the door slammed open, and a group of more strange monsters burst in. Each was a dark green, with piercing purple eyes. They were all patting their heads, muttering something inane.
They all stumbled over the control device, and huddled around the turbine. Quickly, they all began lifting it up, the strength of only around ten of them being enough to lift the massive engine.
"Now, how to get it out of here..." The white and purple creature asked itself. It quickly figured it out, raising his finger in realization.
It turned to the wall behind the turbine, and pulled out more knives. In a flash, it had slashed a massive hole in the wall, revealing the outside, and large enough for the turbine to fit through.
"That'll have to do." He said to himself, before turning to the monsters carrying the turbine. "Get going! We don't have a lot of time, y'know?"
The monsters seemed only dimly aware of what the lead monster had said, as it took them a second to get moving. They ran off into the night, the strange robbery completed.
The main monster turned back to the pig, who was now standing, having watched the entire thing. "Thanks for the turbine, Swinton!" It sincerely thanked, saluting the pig before running into the night itself.
It took a second for the pig to realize what exactly had happened, he stared slack jawed at the massive hole that had been cut through several layers of concrete. His creation was just stolen by some ridiculous monsters.
Coming to, he reached for his phone and dialed for the police.
"Hello? I'd like to report a robbery..."
Meanwhile, at around the exact same time, Judy was staying up late. Way too late, later than she had been up for in nearly three years, even though she was absolutely tired.
She just couldn't stop looking at this book. The one Gai had given them just before he left only a few hours ago.
It was strange, she was learning about the culture of a completely different universe via multi-colored superheroes. She had seen what "humans" had looked like, what the dozens of other Sentai teams had based themselves around.
She had made it through the first three chapters, The History of Sentai, Sentai Teams, and Sentai Robots. She was currently on the fourth chapter, Sentai Villains.
It wasn't entirely interesting to her, she was more one for heroics than for villainy, but the information here would probably end up being useful in the long run.
She was reading it in a haze, her paw rested against her cheek. She was very tired, but she just couldn't stop reading it, even if it was just skimming at this point.
She stopped to look at a picture of one of the villain groups. What looked like a pirate captain, if pirate captains were weird fish goblins, seemed to be the leader. But one figure stood out to her, Sambash, standing amongst a number of other strange figures.
"Heh," She chuckled, still in her tired haze. "What a weirdo..." She mumbled, the memories of the fight from earlier coming back. That weird biker was definitely a character, a violent one, but definitely a character.
Suddenly, a thought struck her, brought on by his visage, and a word in the book.
"Gingaman..."
She flipped back to the page about the Sentai team known as Gingaman. She remembered what she had read a few hours before, they were animal based.
She flipped back to the villain section, and quickly skimmed, just looking at the pictures, looking for something familiar. She saw it, Long, from a week ago.
"Gekiranger." She said to herself, reading the page.
She flipped back, Gekiranger was also animal based.
Her nose twitched, something was going on.
She turned the next page, and saw another familiar monster, Yogostein. This time, the page said he fought Go-Onger, whose page she turned to. Animal based.
She looked at the book, and hopped down from the chair. She walked over to Nick's door, and knocked. No response.
"Should I?" She said to herself, "It is kind of important, but sleep is important too..."
Her sleep-deprived brain told her to open the door and wake her partner up, so she shrugged and entered the room. She walked to the slumbering fox and shook him.
"Augh!" He yelled, leaping from his sleep.
He looked at the rabbit, visibly angry. "Why did you do that?" He asked.
"I think I found something important." She said, "I need you to see this."
Nick sighed, rubbing his paw across his snout, before following the rabbit to the kitchen.
"Okay, so," She started holding up the book, "I found some of the monsters we've met in this book, and there's one really weird connection between them."
"Is it being really ugly?" The fox joked, sitting down at the table, "Because I have a hunch that would connect all of them."
"The connection," She started to explain, "Is that all of them fought against animal based Sentai teams!" She passed the book, turned to the page on Gingaman.
"These are the guys Gai was talking about when we fought the biker dude, right?" Nick asked, examining the page.
"Yeah." Judy answered. "The other two were Long, who fought the Gekirangers, and Yogostein, who fought the Go-Ongers."
Nick placed his paw on his chin, thinking about something. "Gekiranger, Go-Onger..." He said, "I've heard those before."
His eyes widened, and he pounded his free paw against the table. "Those were two of the teams that red guy told us about!"
"Holy smokes, you're right!" Judy said, just realizing. She had thought that AkaRed guy was talking nonsense, and the amount of info from the previous day had caused her to nearly forget about his show.
"There were five he told us about, right?" She asked, the fox nodding in response. "Gekiranger, Go-Onger, Gingaman..." She said to herself, counting them on her fingers.
"Lots of G's, huh?" Nicked joked again.
"Ugh, I just read about all of them!" She facepawed, and snapped her digits, trying to get herself to remember.
She turned back to the book, and turned to the index, glossing over it for any familiar words.
"There they are!" She said excitedly, "Gaoranger and Go-Busters!"
"Gingaman, Gaoranger, Gekiranger, Go-Onger, and Go-Busters..." nick said to himself. They all started with G.
"That must mean..." She realized, "That must mean that all of the main baddies fought these guys!"
"But Yogostein said there were six of them," Nick reminded her, "There's only five teams here."
"Maybe he meant the leader?" She tried to rationalize. She turned to the Go-Busters page, it was very simple, very bare. Obviously Gai hadn't had time to update it. There wasn't even a villain page for the team.
"So, if we're going like that..." Nick continued, "Sambash fought Gingaman, Long fought Gekiranger, Yogostein fought Go-Onger, and that means that Kyuemon guy fought either Gaoranger or Go-Busters."
Judy quickly turned to the Gaoranger villain page, no sign of Kyuemon in the group shot. "Kyuemon probably fought Go-Busters, he's not on the Gaoranger page."
"So, if this pattern keeps up, we'll have seen all the big bads by the next monster attack." Nick guessed. He got up from his seat and headed back to bed, "Anyway, we're gonna have to deal with the chief tomorrow, I suggest you get some rest, Carrots."
She sighed, she was completely exhausted. "I think I will." She said back to him, the fox turning around to give her a smile, which she returned as she headed back to her room.
It was gonna be pretty busy tomorrow, alright.
They had made it through roll call without Bogo mentioning anything about the previous day. Maybe they were in the clear?
As everyone left to go do their duties, Nick and Judy found themselves the only ones left in the room, with only a very stern buffalo for company.
"Officers Hopps, Wilde..." He started, before stopping to snort.
Nick cringed, he knew what was coming.
"My office, right now." He finished, surprisingly calm. That couldn't mean anything good.
Bogo left the room, shaking his head. The two cops looked at each other in panic.
A few minutes later, they found themselves sitting in Bogo's office. The buffalo stared at them, judgmentally, his eyes piercing.
Bogo sighed, "Why, exactly, did you two manage to miss an entire day of work?" He asked.
"Well, sir..." Judy began trying to think up an excuse, only for Nick to interrupt her.
"Yesterday we saw some suspicious activity going on," He started to explain, "It was an otter, meeting up with someone. Some kind of trade, certainly didn't look legal, so we decided to investigate. Undercover stuff, y'know?"
Bogo snorted, placing his hooves together. "I don't believe you, Wilde."
Nick felt his heart drop.
"But," Bogo started again, "I know it is completely unlike you two to miss a day without a good reason."
He sighed again, "You two are good officers, I just want you to honestly tell me why."
"We really, really wish we could, Chief." Judy said. "But we just... really can't."
The buffalo shook his head again. "That's not the only reason I wanted to talk to you." Bogo started again. "I wanted to talk to you two about a somewhat special assignment."
"Parking duty, I'm guessing." Nick joked, the buffalo and rabbit sighing in reply.
"Last night we got a call from the Zootopia Center of Engineering, a doctor Samuel Hamlet called in a robbery." He explained. "The details are certainly... strange, but you two are clever, maybe you can figure it out."
He wrote the address on a card, and handed it to Judy. "Who knows," He stated, "Maybe this will get you two closer to being detectives."
"Well, thanks for not getting too angry with us, Chief." Nick said. The two headed out the door shortly after, Judy staring at the address.
"Detectives..." She said to herself as they walked through the lobby. "Imagine us, as detectives!" She asked her partner excitedly.
"Don't get too excited, Carrots." He replied, the rabbit calming down a bit in response, "It'll still take a lot more big cases before we get to detective level."
The two exited the station and headed to the car, Judy a bit less excited at the idea. "I guess..." She sighed, before perking up, "But wouldn't it be cool? Independent work, dealing with even larger crimes, it'd be like a noir film!"
"I'd rather not be in a noir film." Nick said as they got into the car, "Not colorful enough, too much smoke."
Judy chuckled as she started up the car, Nick putting his sunglasses on. It'd be nice to have at least one day of normal police work again.
"Alright, boys!" The clown yelled to the ogre monsters, "Lower her gently!"
With a large crash, the monsters dropped the turbine on top of the roof they were standing on, causing the entire building to shake.
"I said GENTLY you idiots!" He yelled at the barely aware monsters, more preoccupied with saying their names over and over again, "How hard is it to get some good help for once?"
There was a thumping beneath his feet, somebody hitting the ceiling with a broom, or other long object. "KEEP QUIET UP THERE!" A rather angry voice yelled up.
"Sorry!" Yabaiba yelled back down, "Busy trying to concoct an evil plan up here, I'll be finished in a minute!"
He looked back up at the monsters, still just standing there patting their heads. "Somebody go deal with that guy." Yabaiba ordered.
One of the ogres quickly became aware, and climbed down the ladder to the roof. A smash was heard, and lots of screaming, before the monster climbed back up.
"Alright," Yabaiba joyfully said, rubbing his hands, "Let's get this show started!"
He pulled out the gift the Omnipotence gave him a week ago, a weird spike. He looked at it, glossing over it with his hand, and then felt his own horn. They were exactly the same.
He shrugged, "That's weird, probably not a big deal."
He walked to the large engine, and twirled the horn around in his hand. "So, guess I just do this?" He guessed, before jabbing the horn into the side of the turbine.
The entire machine began glowing purple, shaking violently. "You, an object with no free will of its own, yadda yadda yadda," Yabaiba said, not entirely sure why he felt compelled to, "Become a monster and help me wreck stuff!"
The glowing turbine was suddenly entirely purple, quickly beginning to contort and shift into an entirely new shape. The new monster had a large upper torso, made up of several turbines, two making up its eyes, one popping out of the middle of its face, and one coming out of its back. Its right arm was a bladed turbine, and two large, yellow horns grew directly behind its eyes.
"TURRRRRRBINE ORG!" It yelled triumphantly, before noticing the jester monster, "Oh! A one-horn!"
It knelt down in front of Yabaiba, who quickly gripped one of its horns and pulled it up. "No 'One-horn' crap, alright?" He said, "You, me, and those bozos over there are the only Orgs left."
He let go of the Org as it stumbled back, "What? But last time I checked there were still tons of Orgs left!" It said, baffled and confused.
"Yeah, and last time you checked was fifteen years ago." Yabaiba stated, "But we can fix that!"
He stepped towards the confused Org, and tried his best to wrap his arm around him, "You and me, we'll blow this city away!" He proudly stated, "Literally."
"What!?" The turbine monster said, backing away from Yabaiba, "I don't have the strength to blow an entire city away!"
"Oh." Yabaiba muttered, realizing he was probably jumping ahead. There had to be something he could do...
Suddenly, it came to him. "Alright, here's what you're gonna do." He walked over to the monster to explain, "You're gonna create a storm throughout this city, alright? Then in about..." He stopped to look at an invisible watch on his wrist, "Two hours you come back to me and we get to the real plan."
"Uh, alright." The Org said, a bit confused, "I'll try my best!"
The monster turned to look at the cityscape in front of him, and began revving up his internal engines. Quickly, his eyes began spinning, and produced a large burst of wind, visibly causing smaller objects on the ground level to fly away, including a few mice. Quickly, grey clouds covered the once clear sky.
"Wow!" The Org stated in amazement, "I was never this powerful before!"
"I had only the best turbine chosen for you, mate!" Yabaiba proudly explained, "And if you keep at it, you'll get even stronger!"
"Alright, I'm on it boss!" The monster saluted with his turbine hand, and ran off the building. The engines roared, and it quickly flew away.
"Wow, weather's lookin' pretty bad." Nick said, looking out the window as the continued to drive.
"Is it weird pollution cloud bad, or just normal bad?" Judy jokingly asked.
"Normal bad, looks like we might get a wind storm." He answered back.
"Well, we'll be inside soon enough." She assured, the ZCoE building coming into view.
They pulled into the parking lot, and excited the vehicle, admiring the building's architecture. It certainly looked like a place where new machines would be made, it stood wide and tall, a glass ceiling covering a middle spike between two flat parts of the roof. It was very impressive looking, well made all around.
Well, except for the massive hole in one of the walls.
The two spotted a rotund pig standing by the entrance, who was pacing back and forth nervously, before spying the two cops heading towards him.
"Oh thank goodness!" He said, running up to greet the two. "You two must be the detectives here to investigate!"
"'Detectives' is a strong word," Nick said, shaking the pig's hoof, "We're just cops, Officer Wilde at your service."
"Officer Hopps." Judy said, also shaking the pig's hoof.
"Doctor Samuel Hamlet." The pig greeted, "Come in, i'll show you the crime scene."
He took them into the building, which, despite the size of the place, had absolutely cramped hallways. Hamlet himself could barely fit in them, and anything larger than him would probably end up getting stuck.
He took them into a ruined room, the room the large hole they had seen from the outside led into. They could even see their police cruiser from inside.
"So," Judy asked, a bit baffled, "What exactly happened here?"
"Well," Hamlet began, nervously, "I was working late on a new turbine engine, would have been one of the most powerful engines in the world. Been working on it for years at this point, if it was put into use it could travel from here to Africa in only a few hours!" He continued rambling. "We've spent a lot of money into it, so to just have it stolen like this is..."
"Whoa, slow down there." Nick interrupted, "So, someone stole your million dollar jet engine?"
The pig nodded in response.
"Okay..." Judy asked, a bit confused, "HOW did they steal a massive jet engine?"
"Through the hole." The pig put simply.
"Okay, HOW did they get it through the hole?" She asked, pulling out her notepad.
"That's the strange part about this entire thing." He started, turning to the hole. "They carried it through the hole, out into the street."
"They? Carried? What!?" Nick said, confused at the situation.
"Alright, one step at a time." Judy stated, "What did the perpetrators look like?"
"You've seen those weird monsters that've been attacking the city recently?" Hamlet asked.
The two cops' eyes widened. Suddenly, this was making a bit more sense.
Nick coughed, regaining his composure, "Yeah, we have seen them, hard to miss honestly."
"Well, something that looked an awful lot like one of them stole the engine." Hamlet explained, "This strange purple guy with a horn, and a bunch of these smaller, green monsters."
"Purple, horn..." Judy said to herself, writing it down in her notepad. "Any other distinguishing features?"
"Uh..." Hamlet thought back to the events of the night, "He had yellow eyes, his face looked like a skull, and he had lots of multicolored... things on him. Basically, it looked like nothing I've seen on earth. Kind of like a clown, actually."
She continued writing the description down, but suddenly something hit her. She had seen something like this before. She discretely tugged at the fox's uniform, trying to get his attention.
"What?" He asked quietly.
"I've seen this guy before." She said, looking at her notepad.
The fox seemed to understand, stepping forward. "My partner and I need to have a private conversation out in the hall. Very important, you see." He said, as they went out the door.
The two stood in the hallway and began to quietly talk. "You've seen him before? Where?" Nick asked.
"It was in the book, last night! He was on the Gaoranger page, I think he's one of their villains!" She answered, a bit excited and panicked.
"Then this is our last big bad guy, right?" Nick guessed, a bit happy.
"It must be!" Judy replied back, also sounding a bit happy. They were about to meet the final villain they'd be facing, what would he be like?
The two entered back into the room, a bit more confident. "Dr. Hamlet," Judy announced, "We'll have your jet engine returned to you in no time flat!"
"Oh thank goodness!" The pig sighed in relief, "But, please, please bring it back in one piece! I've spent too much of my life on it to start over!"
"Don't worry, we'll do our best." Nick replied back, the two heading out the door and into the hallway shortly after.
"So, these bad guys make their monsters out of things, right?" Nick asked, the two strolling down the hallway.
"Seems like it." Judy answered, not getting why he was asking.
"And this one stole a massive jet turbine, right?" Nick continued.
"Yes..." Judy was slowly getting what he was getting at.
The two stepped through the door, a sudden large burst of wind hitting them, nearly causing the two to fly off, as well as knocking Nick's shades off his face.
The two looked around, everywhere small objects were blowing around in the wind. This definitely wasn't a normal wind storm.
"Aaaaand we suddenly had a major shift in bad weather, correct?" Nick finished, looking at the rabbit with worry.
Suddenly, their Zoolizers began beeping loudly. There was a monster.
"Oh no."
"Hah, this new power is great!" The Org laughed to himself as he flew across the sky, creating a massive wind storm below him.
He landed on top of a building, settling down to see the chaos he had created. This strength from the turbine he had been created from was amazing, he had never been this powerful before. Even when he was teamed up with Plugma, he never felt this strong.
He got back up, and stretched his arms, "Well, almost time to meet up with the boss!" He took off into the sky again, trying to find the building he was created on. Wasn't exactly easy, the city was huge, and a lot of the buildings looked the same.
He decided to fly lower, trying to spot Yabaiba. Suddenly, he felt a horrible pain in his side, and found himself falling to the ground. He had been shot by something.
With a crash, he fell face first into a dumpster. It both softened his landing, and made it a whole lot more embarrassing.
"Who did that!?" He screamed, rising from the dumpster. He looked around, and spied two figures. One was red, and holding a large, smoking gun. The other was blue, shorter, and had its arms crossed.
"What the?!" He yelled, climbing out of the dumpster awkwardly, "Gaoranger!?"
He looked at them, they seemed different from the last time he had seen them.
"You look shorter than normal, and where's the other three?" He asked, genuinely confused.
The two looked at each other, obviously confused at what the monster had said. "We're not Gaoranger, dude." The red one said to him, putting away the gun.
"W-what!?" The engine seemed genuinely shocked at this, "You mean there's more than one animal based hero team on this planet!?"
"Wait," The red one stepped forward, rubbing his head, "Did your boss not tell you about where you are?"
The turbine rubbed his head, thinking. He had just guessed it was Earth, but maybe it was another planet? "This is still Earth, right?" It asked.
"Yes, it is." The blue one stated, "But it's also... not? I guess that's how it would be to you."
The turbine was feeling very confused. These rangers clearly weren't human, but what were they? After a brief moment, he realized something.
"I don't care!" He yelled, "Let's just fight!"
It rushed towards the two Zoorangers, swinging his sharp looking turbine hand. The two reared themselves to dodge as it got closer, and quickly jumped out of the way as the monster slammed it's now definitely sharp hand into the ground.
The two pulled out their melee weapons, and sliced him on both sides. The surprise pain caused it to double back and topple over, struggling to get up.
"Wow, this guy's really..." Blue said, staring at the flailing engine monster.
"Pathetic?" Red finished, also staring at the monster.
"I'M NOT PATHETIC!" The monster yelled, a sudden burst of air from behind it launching it back to its feet.
It turned around to face the two rangers, and then shot several violent blasts of wind at them. The wind was powerful enough to completely carve dents in the ground, but the two had managed to quickly get out of the way.
Red leaped at the monster with his sword, slicing him in the face repeatedly before landing. As the Org stumbled back, he felt several sharp pains. He was being stabbed repeatedly by the blue one, who then kicked him, launching the creature out of the alleyway and into the middle of the street.
It got up and looked around, noticing something was off with the suburbia. Instead of the humans he enjoyed terrorizing, it was all walking animals. All of which were currently screaming, and running away.
"You better run, you filthy animals!" He yelled at them, before feeling another pain in his back and toppling over.
The two rangers walked out, Blue holding one of her blasters, which was smoking. They stared at the monster, who was once again struggling to get up.
"I dunno, Red," Blue started, a bit solemnly, "I kind of don't want to destroy this guy."
"Yeah, he really is a pathetic loser, huh?" Said a voice from behind them.
"What was that?" Blue asked turning to her partner.
"That wasn't me." He responded. The two turned around, spotting where the voice had come from.
It was a second monster, one who matched the description Hamlet had given them perfectly. It was twirling a knife as it leaned against the wall of the alley. It laughed, and began walking towards them, pushing the two out of the way as it approached the struggling monster.
"Yeesh, though you would've done better than that." It mocked, crouching down to talk to the grounded monster.
"M-master Yabaiba!" It shrieked in fear, "I'm sorry, I didn't know there were Gaorangers here!"
"Yeah, probably should've warned you about that." He nonchalantly said, gripping one of the ogre's horns to help it back to its feet.
"Anyway, I got presents for you all!" Yabaiba cheerfully stated, specifically looking at the two Zoorangers.
The two looked at him, confused. Red looked at his partner, and began to clarify, "In my years of... illegal activities, I've learned that 'presents' from a bad guy..."
Yabaiba pulled out what looked like a large snail shell, an eye embroidered on the side. He thrust it up into the air, causing a large amount of thick, gooey liquid to splatter onto the ground.
As soon as it hit the ground, it began to bubble. The liquid slowly solidified, growing until it reached around the size of a wolf. Suddenly, all the liquid had turned into an army of disgusting, slimy monsters, each one patting their head and muttering something.
"Usually not a good thing." Red finished, as the two pulled out their weapons.
"Orgettes!" Yabaiba cried, snapping his fingers and pointing towards the two, "GEDDUM!"
The ogre creatures rushed towards them, swinging odd looking club weapons. The two rangers responded by rushing forward with their weapons and fighting the strange creatures.
It was a lot more difficult than they were expecting.
Their weapons did cut into the creatures, letting out some sort of strange goo like substance, but they didn't seem to feel any actual pain, or even flinch. The Orgettes just continued trying to sluggishly slam their clubs into the two's faces.
The Zoorangers were definitely struggling, clubs hitting their backs as they attempted to block attacks from the swarm. Blue managed to jump out of the crowd, but was followed by a few Orgettes. At least she wasn't being attacked from behind, but she managed to hear something interesting as well.
"Well, I'd say that's enough help from me." Yabaiba said, turning to the turbine. "I want you to finish those two rangers off, then meet me at the base." He explained to the monster.
"But, where's the base?" The Org questioned.
"The big, really obvious mountain, got it?"
"A mountain?" She said to herself, still struggling to fend off the Orgettes.
While she wasn't looking, Yabaiba melted into a puddle of goo, which quickly vanished. The turbine monster turned to the distracted rangers, readying a plan.
"I'm gonna blow you suckers away!" He yelled, his internal engine roaring.
A strong just of wind quickly blew in their direction, the two rangers pulling out their weapons and stabbing them into the ground in an attempt to stay grounded. It worked, as the two managed to stay firm on the ground. Didn't work out for the Orgettes, however.
Most of the ogre monsters were knocked backwards, into the alleyway. The each landed with a thick, juicy splat, and instantly burst into piles of goo. Only a few managed to survive, but the walls of the alley were now absolutely covered in potentially dangerous glop.
"Oops!" The turbine whimpered, seeing that it had just taken out most of its help.
"Wow, even when you help from your boss you're still a big screw-up." Red mocked, shaking his head in what appeared to be genuine embarrassment.
"Okay, plan." Blue said, running to her partner, "First we deal with the stragglers, then we focus on the big guy."
Red looked back to the monster, and raised his digit. "We'll be back with you in just one moment." He joked, feigning an apology.
"What!? Don't ignore me!" The turbine yelled at them.
"Operators are standing by!" He yelled, rushing towards the slime covered alleyway.
The remaining Orgettes were attempting to get up, and heard the fox yell, turning to see him. In what he would assume looked like an amazingly cool move, Red slid across the slime using the momentum he gained from the run over. The slide allowed him to drift past each ogre at a fast pace, which he took advantage of by slicing through them as he went by.
One by one, the Orgettes exploded into even more goo, all of which Red had managed to avoid. He skid to a halt on the other side of the alleyway, and turned back to admire his work.
"How was that, Blue?" He asked confidently. "Was that a good slime or what? Those guys never goo what was coming to them!" he laughed confidently at his own jokes, before seeing that his partner was standing in the middle of the alley, covered in the slime.
She sighed, "I hope this stuff isn't toxic. For your sake." They both turned back to the monster.
They heard a roar of wind, and Blue quickly found herself knocked off her feet. In a crash, the two found themselves lying on top of each other in pain. When they realized their position, they both quickly got up, awkwardly ignoring it.
The turbine monster walked up to them, "I'll teach you to not take me seriously!" Quickly, the Org fired out several blasts of wind at them, which Red managed to block each and every one of with his sword.
"Let's just get this over with so we can get back to the case." He said, a bit apathetically.
As soon as Red began to perform his finishing attack, the one from the first day they became rangers, something hit Blue.
"Stop!" She yelled, pushing the fox out of his stance.
"Oof!" He grunted, falling to the ground. "What was that for, Carrots?" He asked, getting up.
"The monster is the turbine we're supposed to be finding, remember!?" She impatiently reminded him.
"Oh, yeah." Red responded. He forgot about it in the middle of the fight.
"If we destroy him, the turbine will ALSO be destroyed!" She continued to explain, even though the fox had gotten the point by now.
"A distraction!" The monster yelled, activating his engines. He let out a burst of wind, nearly knocking the two rangers over. Quickly, it flew into the sky, and over a couple buildings.
The two sighed. "Should we go hunt him down before he causes more trouble?" Red asked, pulling out the Vickscannon.
"No, no." Judy said, untransforming. "We should head back to the car and figure out a plan to prevent the turbine from being destroyed."
Nick untransformed as well, and the two headed back to the car.
"Mountain, mountain..." The Org said to himself as he drifted across the outskirts of the city, searching for the mountain Yabaiba had told him to go to.
He was gonna be super angry with him, considering he didn't manage to beat the two rangers, AND almost got killed himself. He'd probably keep that to himself.
Soon, he spotted a mountain, the peak of it hanging just below the sun. He lowered down, and landed on a rock. All he needed now was to find an actual entrance. He felt around with his one hand, trying to find a switch, or maybe a button of some kind.
It took a few minutes, but he finally found the entrance. By complete accident, he found his hand slipping through one of the rocks, and his entire body soon fell after. Disguising the entrance as a rock, brilliant magic.
He stumbled down the hall, and soon found himself in a large room, Master Yabaiba and five other creatures he didn't recognize sitting at a table.
"Well, here comes the loser of the day." The biker like one joked.
"Guessing you didn't beat the Zoorangers, huh?" Yabaiba guessed, walking over to the Org.
"Uh..." The monster muttered, trying not to look Yabaiba in the eyes.
"It's not a big deal, honest!" He said, surprisingly cheerfully. He pulled out a small badge, and held it in front of the Org's face.
"Not when we have this." He eerily said, before jabbing it into the monster's side.
The Org began screaming in pain, which quickly turned into a laughter as its body transformed. The eyes on its turbines disappeared, the turbines themselves growing larger and distending themselves from the body. They now resembled over the top shoulder pads than eyes. As the turbines grew, the horns on top of them shifted down the side, curving upwards.
A large, grey lump slowly formed between the two large turbines, a red eye opening up in the middle of it, a strange mockery of a head. His turbine hand shifted, growing plating around it, looking more like a jet engine now. Finally, a red outline of the Chaos Badge appeared on both of the turbine's sides.
It let out a roar of triumph, it felt amazingly powerful now.
"RARGH! This feels amazing!" It yelled, feeling up its new form.
"I'm sure it does," Yabaiba indignant stated, "Now go blow that city away! Literally."
The Org gave a salute with his turbine hand, and started running down the exit hallway. "I will Master Yabaiba!" It yelled back. "I'll make you proud!" It yelled back again, this time turning around completely to wave at him.
"So your monsters are just as weird as you are, huh?" Yogostein joked from his seat.
"Well, I don't like to brag..."
The two headed back to the cruiser to figure out how to both beat the monster, and save the turbine.
Easier said than done, sadly.
As soon as they had gotten in, the radio started going off. No matter who was calling, it was a bad time, but the two officers had a very, very clear idea of who it was.
The two looked at each other awkwardly, before Judy reached to answer it.
"Officer Hopps, Officer Wilde." As expected, it was the Chief, sounding a lot calmer than they were expecting.
"Chief Bogo, sir," Judy nervously said, "Why are you calling us?"
"I just wanted to know how the case was going." He stated, "Have you found any leads yet?"
"Actually yes, we do have a lead." She said into the transmitter, "We... think that we might, maybe know who it is that stole the turbine."
"Wait, they stole a turbine?" Bogo said, incredulously, "How did they steal a turbine?"
"Uh..." Judy mumbled, trying to think up an explanation, "Through... the wall?"
Despite not being able to visibly see Bogo, the two easily pieced together that he was facepalming.
"Well, you found a lead at least," He said. "That's better than I was expecting..." He tried to say under his breath, not realizing the two had heard it. "Anyway, I also want you two to return to headquarters."
"What!?" The two officers yelled.
"N-no offense, Chief, but we're really close to finding the perp!" Judy tried to argue, the buffalo interrupting her.
"No buts, Hopps." He interrupted, "There's been reports of a monster running about, and with the wind storm going on, I'm calling all officers back to headquarters. For their safety."
Judy sighed, "Alright, we'll be back at headquarters soon." She hung up the transmitter.
"Sucks we can't tell him what's going on, huh?" Nick joked.
"It is weird how all these things connected." Judy said, starting the cruiser up.
"So, we're supposed to be coming up with a plan, right?" Nick reminded her.
"Yeah." She responded, "How are we supposed to save the turbine from being destroyed when we beat the monster?"
"Hmm..." Nick leaned back in thought. "Maybe we could trap him in a small area, and then destroy it?" He proposed, "Then the turbine wouldn't fly up so high and we could stop it."
"I don't think that would work." Judy said, "It would probably just smash against something else instead."
The fox sighed, "I got nothing."
Judy chuckled, "I thought you were good at coming up with plans, Slick Nick."
"Plans, yes, physics puzzles, no." Nick responded back.
"Well, what if we..." Judy began, trying to think and drive at the same time, "What if we catch it in midair?"
"With what?" Nick asked, a bit baffled, "A giant net?"
She awkwardly chuckled to herself, "I guess we really don't have anything to catch it with."
"This is going a bit off topic, but..." Nick sat up, suddenly turning a bit serious, "Have you noticed anything off with the Chief?"
"What do you mean?" Judy asked, a bit confused.
"He's just been acting a bit less..." He spun his hand around, trying to think up the right word, "A bit less Bogo-y than usual."
Judy looked at her partner, an exasperated look on her face.
"Alright, remember when Wolford was three hours late to roll call a few months back?" He asked, trying to spark an example for her.
She laughed, remembering the event. Wolford had somehow slept in, and got lost on the way to the headquarters. Probably one of the worst possible days for anyone in the precinct to have.
"Remember how Bogo put him on record duties for three weeks after that?" Nick continued, "We missed an entire day and got no repercussions, how does that happen?"
Nick was right, it was definitely strange that Bogo hadn't really given them any punishment for the previous day. Normally, he would have put them on a year's worth of record keeping and parking duties, maybe both at the same time even.
"Well, there has been a lot of weird stuff going on." Judy remarked, glancing at her Zoolizer, "Maybe he thinks putting two officers off duty during all this would be a bad idea?"
"I dunno, I think there might be something else going on." Nick suspected.
"Maybe you should ask him when we get back to the HQ." Judy joked as the station came into view.
"Yeah, I'd rather stick my tail in a wood chipper."
Suddenly, a loud beeping noise filled the car, as well as vague red and blue lights. The two recoiled from the awful sound.
"Oh come on, seriously!?" Judy yelled, thinking about how suspicious this would look.
"Well, it's not like we have a choice." Nick said, a bit exhausted.
"But we didn't even come up with a plan!" Judy yelled in a bit of a panic.
"We'll just wing it." Nick said, the car quickly turning from the turn to the station.
"Let's see what I can do now!" The monster yelled to itself.
He looked around the city block with his singular eye, looking for the perfect target. He found it, an apartment building, a bit derelict, but otherwise intact. It was perfect.
"There we go!" The turbine said, rubbing his turbine hand in joy. "HERE SHE BLOWS!" It yelled, revving up its new turbine engines.
The resulting wind was immensely powerful, the glass of the apartment instantly shattering. Soon, it began to collapse into a pile of rubble, which then began to be thrown into the building behind it. His wind was far more powerful than before, no doubt about it.
The Org laughed to itself, "I can't wait to beat up those- ACK!" A sharp pain in the back quickly stopped its gloating.
It turned around, spotting the rangers he was planning to beat up. "Do you two always shoot people in the back!?" In yelled in a rage.
"Well," Red began, dropping the cannon he was holding down, "Only when someone ignores us."
"You can just say something!"
The two looked at each other, "Nah, I'd rather shoot you." Red said, turning back to the turbine.
"Oh, speaking of," Blue began, "Should we do that roll call thing?"
The fox shrugged, "I don't really want to, but apparently that's a Sentai thing, so I guess we should."
"CHAMPION OF THE SUN, ZOORED!" He yelled, performing a brief pose.
"DEFENDER OF THE MOON, ZOOBLUE!" Blue followed, also doing a short pose.
The two then rushed forward, each wielding their melee weapons. Red went first, leaping into the air and slicing the monster several times with the Foxfire Blade. Blue followed up, leaping off of Red's head in order to get behind the monster and slice him in the back.
"Hey," Blue asked the fox on the other side of the monster, who was busy clashing his sword with it's arm, "Does he look different to you?"
"Yeah, his shoulders are bigger." Red joked, before being knocked backwards by the monster's attacks.
It aimed it's now covered turbine hand towards the ground, which fired a blast of air. The blast launched it upwards, where it landed a few feet away from them.
"Fools!" It yelled at the two, "I am stronger than ever before! I, Chaos Turbine Org, will be your ultimate foe! Your strongest adversary! Your worst nightmare!"
"Apparently his ego got bigger too." Blue snarked at the monster.
"TAKE THIS!" It yelled, energy building up in its horns. The energy soon shot between the horns, which then fired forward as a big bolt of lightning.
The two managed to dodge it, just barely. The bolt left behind a large chunk of cracked, blackened asphalt.
"OR MAYBE YOU'D LIEK SOME OF THIS!?" It yelled again, sticking its turbine arm towards them as it revved up. The turbine shot several blasts of sharp air towards them, which the two managed to once again dodge swiftly.
However, they didn't manage to dodge the explosions that the blasts had created, knocking the Zoorangers off their feet.
"Alright," Red said to himself, struggling to stand up, "He wants to do the blaster thing? We can do that too." He turned to his partner, who was also struggling a bit.
The fox pulled out the Vickscannon, as well as it's matching ZooTag, "You ready to feel the heat?" He said to the monster.
He stuck the tag into the gun, which began to charge up with lights and noises.
"BRING THE HEAT!
BURNING HEART!
BOOM BOOM!
VICKSCANNON!"
He pulled the trigger, causing a massive fireball to shoot from the cannon, directly at the Org.
"Hah, do you really think that's enough!?" It began revving up its turbines, which quickly produced a powerful wind.
The wind managed to slow down the fireball to a near halt, before beginning to fire it in the opposite direction, directly towards ZooRed.
He let out a small yipe as the massive fireball headed back towards him, quickly jumping out of the way as it hit the ground. The only thing left of where it hit was a large crater.
"Alright," Blue began, running up to her startled partner, "Projectiles, not a good idea." She helped him up, his knees shaking a bit.
"You're telling me!" He yelled to her.
"What are you poor rangers supposed to do now, huh!?" The turbine monster yelled proudly, "You can't even get close to me!"
He was right, he could push them away or get out of any attack they did up close, and counter any projectile they fired at him. Blue tried to think of a plan, something to beat this guy. She could only think of one thing.
"Well, it's not like you can hit us either!"
Insults.
The Org reacted in disbelief, "W-what!? I can totally hit you from this far away!" He attempted to prove his point by firing a bolt of electricity at the two rangers, who managed to swiftly dodge out of the way.
"Face it, Airhead," Red smugly stated, throwing his blade over his shoulder, "We're too fast for even your fastest attacks!"
"Yeah, you'd have to get up close and personal to hurt us!" Blue continued, trying to goad the monster into getting closer.
They had officially entered a stalemate. The monster wasn't sure what to do, it was obviously some sort of trap, but he couldn't exactly do anything to them if he didn't fall for it.
It growled in response, rushing towards the two rangers, swinging his turbine arm.
Soon, the three were locked in close range combat once again. The monster nearly instantly regretting his decision as he found himself being struck by multiple weapons, none of which he could dodge effectively.
"I probably should have thought this through!" The Org panted, as he suddenly felt something jab into his back.
Blue had jabbed her combined blasters into the monster's back, where they were whirring with noise.
"Surprise!"
"CUTTING ON THROUGH!
SLICING THE SKY!
CHANBARA BAN!
RABBLASTERS!"
With a squeeze of the trigger, a sharp blast struck through the Org's midsection, causing it to fly off and hit the ground.
The monster struggled to get up from the ground, stumbling over a few times before it finally got up. "This ground stuff really isn't doing it for me." He announced, the sound of his turbines revving filling the air, "Maybe we should CHANGE THINGS UP!"
"BRACE YOURSELF!" Blue yelled to her partner, jabbing her daggers into the ground, the fox quickly following suit with his sword.
The wind whipped and whirled around them, the two struggling to stay on the ground. It was like a tornado versus some really stubborn trees.
"Let's crank it up a notch!" The monster yelled, as the winds suddenly began to get even stronger. Now it was feeling like a hurricane, and the two couldn't hold on any longer.
Their weapons slipped from the ground, as the rangers found themselves being launched high up into the air.
The fox closed his eyes for a few seconds, his heart beating like a drum being played by an overly zealous drummer. He opened his eyes. All he could see was blue and white, the sky and the clouds. He couldn't feel anything below him, and the only thing he could hear was the sound of the wind.
He closed his eyes tightly, and began speaking, "Carrots, can you hear me?" He asked, hoping for a reply.
Surprisingly, he got one.
"I'm here, Red. Don't look down."
"I wasn't planning to." He replied back.
Suddenly, something hit him, knocking the fox away, sending him spinning through the air and forcing him to open his eyes. He briefly caught a sight of what was below him. It was Zootopia, he was miles above of the city, higher than the central tower.
He began to scream.
"I see someone's afraid of heights, huh?" A voice said from below him.
The turbine monster raised up in front of him, staring at the fox directly with his piercing red eye.
Red gripped his sword, and fearfully swung it at the monster, in a near panic. The monster backed away as soon as he started, the fox continuing to swing the blade without realizing he was missing.
"Wow, you're pathetic!" It said to the panicking ranger, following up with a swift punch to the gut with his turbine arm.
He flew back, suddenly spying his partner a few feet above him. "You got an idea, Blue?" He asked, trying not to sound terrified.
"Yeah! You just gotta get him to stop moving around for a second!" She called down to the falling fox.
"What!?" He yelled up in disbelief, "Why do I have to do it!?"
"You'll see!" She answered back, "Just trust me!"
The fox gulped, and took a deep breath. He looked for the monster, and ultimately found him when another blast of air knocked both of the rangers upwards.
Red saw him below them, zipping around the air. There had to be a way to stop him from this far away, right?
Suddenly, he remembered something.
"Hope this still works!" He yelled, pulling out his Foxfire Blade.
He swung it forward, causing the blade to detach from the hilt, still connected by a wire, and fly directly towards the monster. It stabbed itself directly into the Org's chest, which is signified with a loud, horrible scream of pain.
The wire suddenly stiffened, and Red found himself being launched towards the monster. The two connected, causing them both to spin and flip around, the turbine monster ending up as a platform for the fox to stand on.
He looked back up to his partner, who was now holding her daggers. He gave a thumbs up to her, which she visibly nodded to. Obviously, whatever she had planned was ready to go.
She readied her knives, aiming them at the monster's turbine engines. Those were the two things causing them the most trouble. She threw the knives at them, which stabbed into the turbines, causing small explosions.
"MY TURBINES!" It yelled, flailing, "YOU IDIOTS, WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!"
Red's eyes widened, as he tried not to look beneath the monster. "He's right! Do you have a plan for this, Blue!?" He asked, beginning to panic again.
She pulled out a ZooTag, one he couldn't quite make out. She then pointed downwards, headfirst, attempting to get to Red's altitude.
She put the tag in, causing the Zoolizer to light up.
"DEFENDERS OF NATURE
ARE YOU SURE?
LOOK UP AND COMBINE!
ZOOSAGI!"
The large blue rabbit robot from the previous day appeared below them, Blue landing on it safely as it fell down with them.
He got what she was doing. Pulling out his sword from the monster, Red attempted to leap to the robot.
He waved his legs in mid-air, performing a jump he thought was nearly impossible for anyone to perform. He stared back down at the city, anxiety filling him once again.
What was even worse, was that he missed.
Hi heart was going at Mach speed, time slowing down as he reached his paw out to try and grip onto the robot.
A pair of paws suddenly gripped his, flinging him onto the giant mech.
"Thanks, Fluff." He said to his assistant, lying flat on his back.
"No problem." She replied, exhausted, "Let's get in this robot before we crash land."
She hopped over to a small panel on top of the rabbit robot, which slid open. She jumped in, the fox quickly following her in. They both landed in the cockpit of the robot, Red finally able to catch his breath.
"I didn't know you were afraid of heights." Blue joked.
"I'm not." He angrily denied.
She rolled her eyes, and grabbed the odd controls, pulling them backwards. The rabbit robot suddenly flipped upwards, moving it directly above the turbine monster.
"Have a nice fall!" She quipped, jolting the rabbit ear joysticks forward.
ZooSagi jolted its foot forward in a kick, launching the monster of with a loud scream.
"Alright, let's head back to solid ground and finish him off!" Red announced, peering over the rabbit's seat.
She nodded, shifting the controls so that the ZooSagi would go into an even faster fall. Soon, the rabbit landed on the street, with a resounding crash, but neither of the pilots inside feeling anything.
"You know, those were some pretty clever plans, Blue." The fox admitted.
She shrugged, a bit embarrassed. "Those weren't really... plans." She admitted, "I was just kind of... winging it."
"Really?" Red replied, a bit incredulously, "Your 'winging it' plans sure seemed structured."
"Maybe that's just how my mind works, I don't know." She shrugged.
"I mean, summoning the mech was..." He paused, something struck him. "We gotta go beat that guy, now."
"What? But we need..."
"I have one." Red finished for her, "I have a plan."
"Is this a 'winging it' plan or an actual plan?" The rabbit questioned.
"I mean, it's kind of both but..." He paused, the monster was ready to be beaten, and they were busy arguing. "Listen, you just need to trust me on this, alright?" He finished, looking the rabbit directly in the eyes.
She sighed, "Alright, let's go do your plan."
They hopped out of the giant rabbit robot, seeing a smoking crater several yards away from them.
"I hate being presumptuous, but I think we know where he landed." Red joked.
They ran over to the crater, and peered down into it over the side. It was absolutely massive, and in the middle of it was the unmoving body of the monster.
"I think he's already dead." Blue mused.
"He can't be dead, he didn't explode."
The fox swiped up a piece of debris, and hurled it at the monster's body, where it hit with a loud, metallic clunk. It shuddered in response, and attempted to get up.
It moaned in pain, and turned to see the two rangers staring at it from above. "Why did you throw a rock at me!?" It angrily questioned.
"Sorry, we thought you were having a nap in the middle of our fight." Red joked, feigning sympathy. He turned to his partner, pulling out both of his weapons, "Let's finish this."
She followed, pulling out her weapons. Throwing them all in the air, they all combined into the Zookaizer, which landed in their grasps.
Red turned to his partner, who was currently holding the bottom of the barrel, and began to explain his plan, "Alright, as soon as the blast hits that guy, we need to move the cannon upwards, got it?"
"I'm not entirely sure I see how this is going to help us get the turbine back." She replied skeptically.
"It'll work." He assured, "Just trust me."
He pulled the trigger, causing a burst of energy to fire forth at the dazed monster, which began to push it backwards.
"MOVE IT UP!" Red yelled to his partner.
She began pushing the bottom of the barrel upwards, noticing that the blast was still continuing. It was dragging the monster along with it, right up into the air. The Zookaizer was facing directly upwards at this point, something the two were struggling to even do.
Blue was pushing it upwards with her back, and Red was grabbing onto the sides, trying to get it to not go directly into the ground. Hopefully this plan worked.
The Org was being pushed into the air, almost as high as the central tower, screaming all the way. In a quick flash, he felt the beam go right through him. He erupted into a magnificent explosion.
From the ground, the two rangers couldn't see much, but they did see a large white object begin to fall down.
Red quickly plugged a ZooTag into the Zoolizer. A red flash happened, and suddenly ZooKitsune was there.
"Play fetch!" He yelled, pointing towards the turbine.
With a swift leap, the fox robot leaped into the air, and snagged the turbine gently in its metallic jaws.
It landed with a crash, shaking the two rangers, and then gently placed the turbine in front of them.
"So, that was your plan?" Blue questioned.
"Yep." Red proudly replied, "Got it when you summoned your giant robot. Pretty clever, huh?"
"Clever isn't the word I'd use, but it worked." She said, sighing in relief.
Suddenly, they heard a metallic clink behind them. Turning around, they saw the red badge that the monster from the other day had melted into.
Blue hopped over to it, and attempted to grab it. She was met with a sharp bolt of red energy, which knocked her backwards.
"BLUE!" The fox yelled, running over to his injured partner. "Oh god, are you alright?" He asked, holding her up in his arms.
"Yeah, I'm fine..." She replied with a cough, "But what is..."
They both looked at the red badge, which began to float in the air, crackling with a sinister red energy.
"Oh great, not again." Red bemused, helping his partner up.
They watched as the badge flew into the distance, over to the outskirts of the city. In a flash, the monster reappeared, absolutely massive on the horizon.
"YOU CAN'T BLOW ME DOWN THAT EASILY!" It cried, the two being able to hear it from miles away.
"Y'know, I was hoping we wouldn't have to do another big robot fight." Red admitted.
"I think this is just a thing we're going to have to live with." Blue replied back, shaking her head.
The two turned to their massive robot partners, and jumped into their cockpits. They stomped towards the monster at incredible speeds, navigating the road towards it and leaping from roof to roof until they reached the outskirts.
As they reached the monster, the robots looked at the large monster, ZooKitsune letting out what sounded like a mechanical growl. The fox robot leaped at the monster in an attempt to startle it.
"Take this, foxface!" It yelled, activating the turbines. At this size, the strength of the wind was even higher. It blew the fox robot away, directly into a building, which smashed and shattered when it hit.
"RED!" The rabbit yelled, looking into a monitor showing the toppled cockpit. "Are you alright!?" She worriedly asked, the fox nowhere in sight. She got her response with a thumbs up coming from below the control panel.
She sighed in relief, and then turned back to the monster, who was laughing at them. The rabbit mech leaped at it, preparing a flying kick, but it was once again blown away by the monster's turbines, this time sliding across the ground of the outskirt's field.
She groaned, getting up, seeing her partner also getting up on the screen. "So, we can't get near this guy with the robots." She stated, it was pretty plainly obvious. "Do you have a Wilde-patented plan for getting us out of this?" She asked, still shaken up.
He looked around the cockpit in silence, feeling his paw up against the control panel. He was searching for something. After a moment, his face brightened up. At least, she could tell it did under the helmet.
"'Kay, Blue." He began, "You see the hole between the ears on these things?"
She looked between the two joysticks, noticing there was indeed a small slot. "Yeah, I do. What are they for?" She asked.
"Just put the robot's ZooTag into it." He explained, pulling out his own tag and sticking it in.
"Alright…" She said, following along by pulling out the rabbit's ZooTag. She put it in the slot, and suddenly a large button, one much like the button on the Zoolizer, began glowing blue.
"On the count of three…" Red began to explain over the screen, "Hit that button."
They both raised their paws into the air, waiting for the signal.
"One…"
She tensed up a bit, what was he planning?
"THREE!"
In a panic, she hit the button, in almost perfect sync with the fox.
The eyes of the robots began to glow as they leapt to their feet. They leaped into the air and began to change shape.
ZooKitsune's tail separated from its body. Its head then raised, the mouth opening up to reveal a face. Its body split in half and folded out, turning into a pair of arms and a torso. ZooSagi's back then folded out, forming a lower torso and a pair of legs, the waist ending with a rabbit head-like belt. The two then attached, one of the hands gripping onto the tail that had detached, which now resembled a curved sword.
It landed on the ground with a crash. The robot towered above the buildings, reaching the monster in height. Inside of the robot, the two found their cockpits moving upwards, and eventually attaching, back to back. The cockpits circled inside of a large room, both of them managing to see from the robot's eyes at the same time.
"What the…?" The rabbit looked around, stunned at her new surroundings. She turned to look at her partner, who was pumping his fist in excitement.
"Yessssssss." He whispered in excitement, "Giant robot!"
"This is pretty amazing." She admitted, looking at the monster. "How's it feel to fight someone your own size!?" She yelled at the monster.
"Feels like a fair fight!" It yelled back, still sure of itself.
"Well, let's see how fair he thinks this is." Red said to his partner as they both jolted the controls forward.
The robot rushed forward at an incredible speed, and leaped into the air. The monster watched on, stunned and unprepared, as a blade sliced through its chest, knocking it to the ground with an explosion.
The monster groaned as it got up, standing before the robot. "L-lucky shot!" It yelled. "Let's see if this blows your fancy!" It began to rev up the engines again, blowing its harsh wind at the giant mech.
The robot stood firm as the wind clashed against its metallic body. It stepped forward, the monster powering up the turbines as the robot closed in. It still didn't budge as it continued, the Org getting more nervous as it attempted to make the wind stronger, which it found it couldn't do.
"W-what!?" It cried in fear.
The robot was within arm's reach of the monster, looking it directly in the eye. It drew its sword and prepared it for an attack.
"ANIMAL KINGDOM Z-CROSS CUTTER!" The pilots yelled in unison, almost instinctively.
The blade began glowing a series of colors, red, blue, and yellow. In a flash, the blade cut across the upper half of the turbine monster's body, leaving a visible streak of light. It then sliced at a diagonal downwards angle, again leaving a trail of light on the monster's body. A third strike, this one across the monster's midsection. The streaks of light now resembled a large Z. The final strike, the robot stabbed directly through the monster, appearing on the other side of it. A circle enveloped the Z-marking, which then exploded.
The monster grunted as it fell to the ground. "Looks like I'm the one who got blown away!" It cried, before exploding into a massive explosion.
"Wasting his last words on a bad pun." Red said, admiring the explosion, "I hope my last words are as good as that."
Blue laughed in response, as the robot jabbed it's sword into the ground and striking a pose.
"Wait, we need to return the turbine, right?"
Hamlet was in a bit of a panic. He had been inside since the reports of the wind storm and the monster attacks, but he was far more worried about his invention than his own well-being.
He paced up and down the small hallway, his mind in a clutter about the engine. Was it alright? What exactly did that monster want with it? What if he had stolen it entirely out of spite?
Suddenly, a quake shook the building, nearly knocking the pig into the ceiling. It was coming from outside his testing room.
He rushed in, slamming the door open. What he saw nearly made him faint. His turbine was safely placed back in the room, and a large, robotic fox stood behind it, peering into the hole. In front of the turbine stood two figures, one in red, and one in blue.
"Zoo Rangers!?" He yelled in joyous surprise, "Did you save my engine?"
"Indeed we did, citizen." Red said, putting on his fake, deeper voice.
"But what happened to those two officers?" The pig asked, sounding a bit worried.
"Oh, they, uh…" Blue responded back, not trying to hide her voice. "They helped us find it!"
"Yeah," Red continued, still in his deep voice. "They helped us locate where the monster was, and defeat it!"
"Weird coincidence that it ended up being connected to a monster, huh?"
The pig nodded, "Wow, I can't believe those two knew the Zoorangers!" He admitted. "Guess I shouldn't have worried so much!"
"Enjoy your turbine, Mr. Hamlet." Red finished. "We need to return to our home base." He said, nudging his partner.
The two hopped onto the big fox robot, which turned and began to run off.
The pig walked out of the large hole in the wall, and began waving to the rangers. "Thank you Zoo Rangers! You're my heroes!"
They turned and waved back, before turning back in front of them.
"Nick, can you write today's report?"
After writing up a rather convincing report on the supposed events of the day, the two returned to their apartment, preparing for the next day.
"That robot was pretty cool, huh?" Nick said, laying down onto the couch.
"It was, I guess." Judy replied back, rubbing her eyes in exhaustion.
"Should we give it a name?" The fox asked. "Everything else we have has a name."
"Hmm."
Judy turned to the Sentai Encyclopedia, still sitting on the table. She hopped up to it, and flipped open to the third chapter; Sentai Robots. She flipped through it, and examined the names of a number of them.
She began to tap her foot on the floor, in thought. She turned a page, and a sudden surge of inspiration came through her mind.
Liveman. Animal based. The robot was named LiveRobo. That was it.
"ZooRobo!" She cried out in triumph.
"That's pretty good, Fluff." Nick admitted, sitting up from the couch. He got up and walked over to her, looking at the book. "Maybe a big plagiaristic, but good."
He then though of something. "Hey, can I see something?" He asked, grabbing the book before Judy could even respond.
He flipped to the villains section, and to the page they were looking at earlier this morning. "Duke Org, Yabaiba." He read aloud.
"What?"
"That guy's name, he didn't introduce himself to us like the other guys." Nick explained.
"He seemed like kind of a doofus too." Judy said. "What was even his plan?"
"Well he does look like a clown, it was probably something dumb."
"You know what was really dumb?" She rhetorically asked, "Him saying where his base was out loud!"
"What." Nick replied flatly, placing the book down.
"You probably didn't hear it over all the monsters, but thanks to my rabbit ears, I heard him!" She said.
"Where did he say the base was?" Nick asked, sounding a bit more serious.
"A mountain, probably one just off the outskirts of the city."
"A mountain… outside the city…" He said to himself, thinking. He pounded his fist into his palm. "Mt. Animalia! Their base is in Mt. Animalia!"
Mt. Animalia was one of the first landmarks discovered when Zootopia was founded. It was incredibly unique, standing higher than should even have been possible for the relatively flat are it rested on. The founders took it as a sign, that anyone could be anything, that even a flat plateau could have a beautiful mountain.
"I mean, that is the only mountain near here."
"Yes, but now we actually know that." He said. "So, when do we go?" He asked, jokingly.
"I suggest we not do that." Judy replied. "Getting to the mountain is a journey on its own, and you know what happens if we manage to find the base?"
"Yes, we go in and get our rears handed to us on a silver platter. I was joking, Carrots."
"Good, I was really hoping you weren't that crazy." She replied in relief.
"The phrase is 'crazy like a fox', not stupid like a fox."
"Well," Judy started, hopping down from her chair, "I say we head to bed soon, in case anything weird happens tomorrow."
She was probably just tired from the lack of sleep she had gotten the night before, but she was right. They had done well today, but the fatigue would eventually catch up with them if they kept staying up late.
"Alright." He chuckled as the rabbit entered her room. "Goodnight, Fluff!"
"Goodnight, Slick!" She yelled from her room, as the fox entered his own room.
A break would be nice after the last few days…
"Auuuuuuggghhhhh!" Yabaiba let out, slamming his head against the table. "This was supposed to be my big debut, and I blew it!" He quickly sat up. "Heh, blew it. Wind puns." He slammed his head back onto the table and began moaning again.
"Your plan was really dumb, you clown." Sambash told him frankly.
"Mm." Yogostein nodded in agreement, "If you want to succeed, you need to come up with something a bit more… plausible than literally blowing away an entire city."
Yabaiba sat up and pointed at the robot, "Hey, it almost worked!"
"No it didn't." The biker and robot said in accidental unison, which caused the Org to fall back down again.
"Bonjour my compagnons!" A voice said, entering the room.
"Great, here comes the fruit pie." Sambash said. "I'm getting' out of here." He began heading towards the exit as he saw Enter.
"I wouldn't call your plan a complete failure, pitre." Enter admitted, hovering over the Org.
"What?" Yabaiba turned over, the back of his head now resting on the table.
"Your plan helped me figure out how clever those two actually are." He said. "Also, have you two ever considered using the machines you turn into monsters against them?"
"What do you mean?" Yogostein asked.
"Today, those two had trouble defeating your monster because they wanted to save the turbine used to create it." He explained. "I feel you could maybe use that to your… advantages."
"Hmm, never thought about that." Yabaiba said to himself. "That's a pretty good idea, thanks Ember!"
Enter turned to the clown, an unamused look on his face. "It's Enter."
"Whatever."
Enter rolled his eyes, and began heading for the exit. "The Zoorangers need one final test before I can truly judge their abilities." He stepped outside, the moonlight bathing on him.
"Prepare yourselves, Zooranger. I hope you enjoy games."
It was late at night. Due to the events of the last day, Bogo was working overtime checking on reports. Most of them were pretty open and shut, simple robbers making use of the wind to steal things, mice rescued from falling to their deaths, the usually in a storm.
Then came the one he was regretting.
Officer Hopps and Wilde's report on their rescue of Dr. Hamlet's experimental turbine… as written by Nick Wilde himself.
He could tell something was going on just with that. Hopps wasn't exactly the lying type, but Wilde definitely was. If she got him to write the report, something had to have been covered up. Underestimating their Chief was something they would have to talk about later.
He read over the report a few times. It was a water tight, well written tale about how they had just so happened to meet up with the Zoo Rangers, and that the wind storm, monster, and theft were all connected. It continued with them helping the super heroes figure out a plan to defeat the monster and save the engine.
But a tale was all it was, as far as he was concerned.
They just so happened to meet the super heroes, and all three events happened to be connected. Considering some events, the last part was believable, if not exactly what happened, but the Zoo Rangers aspect bothered him.
There were lots of reports on the Zoo Rangers, but nobody could get a hold of the two cops for the entire day, until they suddenly showed up back at the station.
The buffalo sat there, thinking this over. The two had been acting strange the last few days, the missed days, the obviously bluffed "hurt leg" excuse.
And every time they disappeared, the Zoo Rangers would show up.
The rabbit and the fox.
It suddenly clicked in his mind. It was far too obvious to not gloss over.
He sighed in relief, the Zoo Ranger identity case was off his chest, but another problem struck him almost instantly.
What should he do with them?
The choices were either to arrest them, something the Mayor would get on his tail about, and probably leave him jobless, or to tell the Mayor about them, and have these two heroes dogged by reporters no matter what they were doing.
He snorted.
"I think the Mayor can wait a bit longer to figure it out."
He chose option three.
Sorry for the… even longer break. Yo-kai Watch 2 came out. And also I got sick. Win-lose, am I right?
Also, between this and the last episode, Kamen Rider Ex-Aid started airing, that looks pretty good, but that's neither here nor there.
This episode was genuinely kind of a pain to write, it was mostly the plan to save the engine that got me a bit flustered, but I feel it worked out in the end.
We're nearing the end of the first real arc, so to you readers I say, join us next time for a real race against time.